Democrat Sheriff Attacked Kash Patel Over the Guthrie Case Even While Sitting on the Evidence He Wanted

Kash Patel revealed the FBI was locked out of the Nancy Guthrie search for four straight days.

Now the Democrat sheriff running that investigation is firing back publicly instead of answering for what he withheld.

Chris Nanos attacked Kash Patel's credibility while his own deputies were already trying to push him out the door.

Fox News and the Daily Caller Reveal Nanos Denied the FBI Access to Key Evidence

Nancy Guthrie, the 84-year-old mother of "Today" host Savannah Guthrie, vanished from her Tucson home back in February.

Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos has run point on the case ever since.

Kash Patel told Sean Hannity his agents were kept out of the investigation for the first four critical days, and Fox News reported that Nanos's department sent DNA evidence to a private lab in Florida instead of the FBI's own lab in Quantico.

The New York Post reported that Patel said his bureau could have analyzed that DNA within days and gotten better results, calling his own lab better than any private outfit.

Before that dispute ever broke, the Daily Caller reported that Nanos was refusing to hand federal investigators a glove and DNA evidence tied to the case, citing a law enforcement source through Reuters.

A Democrat sheriff sitting on physical evidence in an 84-year-old woman's disappearance is not a bureaucratic turf spat.

It is exactly the kind of local stonewalling that turned the JonBenet Ramsey case into a permanent unsolved case, when Boulder police refused to loop in the FBI early and evidence got mishandled for good.

Nanos had a choice between transparency and territory, and he chose territory.

Nanos's Own Deputies Gave Him a 98.8% Vote of No Confidence

Instead of explaining that decision, Nanos went public and dismissed Patel's account as coming from bad information.

In a new interview, he claimed his agents worked alongside the FBI from the very first day and pushed back hard on the four-day timeline Patel laid out.

Nanos also volunteered, unprompted, that he has never once met or spoken to Patel in person.

Think about that for a second.

A county sheriff is picking a public fight with the director of the FBI over a missing woman's case and admits the two men have never had a conversation.

That is not confidence.

That is a man who knows his record cannot survive a real conversation.

The Pima County Deputy's Organization, the union representing his own department's rank and file, already gave Nanos a vote of no confidence with 98.8 percent of responding deputies questioning his leadership.

Nanos is also facing accusations that he lied about his El Paso Police Department record on his resume and repeated that story under oath during a sworn deposition, according to the Washington Examiner.

A recall campaign against him fell just short of the signatures needed to reach the ballot, but only after Nanos was already forced to answer to the county board of supervisors for the discrepancies.

This is a sheriff with a documented credibility problem attacking the credibility of the man whose agency offers a $100,000 reward to help find Nancy Guthrie.

Savannah Guthrie's family has put up a million dollars of their own money because they do not trust this case is being handled the way it should be.

Nanos still will not say whether he believes Nancy Guthrie is alive, insisting there is no evidence confirming her death while refusing to close the door either way.

Meanwhile the same sheriff who cannot answer that basic question wants America to believe he has nothing to hide from the FBI.

Patel Called Out the Stonewalling and Nanos Proved His Point

Patel called out a documented pattern, and Nanos responded by attacking the man who exposed it.

That is the oldest trick in local government, and Pima County's own deputies have watched Nanos run it before.

Every day this case goes unsolved is another day Nanos spends managing his own reputation instead of managing the investigation.

Savannah Guthrie's mother is still missing, and the man in charge of finding her is too busy fighting with the FBI to explain why he kept them out in the first place.

Sources:

• Fox News, "FBI Director Kash Patel says agency was sidelined in Nancy Guthrie case," Fox News, May 6, 2026.
• New York Post, "FBI Director Kash Patel calls out Nancy Guthrie sheriff over handling of DNA," New York Post, May 6, 2026.
• Anthony Iafrate, "Democratic Sheriff Reportedly Not Giving FBI Access To Key Evidence In Guthrie Case," Daily Caller, 2026.
• Washington Examiner, "Arizona sheriff faces recall effort over Nancy Guthrie case," Washington Examiner, March 27, 2026.